Book Spotlight: Under The Sword by Luv Lubker

 

From acclaimed Victorian historical author, Luv Lubker, the author of "Under His Spell" comes the continuing romance of the Princess Royal Victoria and Frederick III of Prussia.

Join Queen Victoria's eldest daughter and her husband, future German Emperor Frederick III in this third installment of The Rival Courts family saga, as they climb the treacherous path to their dream of German unification in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870.

In the calm after the storm, Vicky and Fritz have it all: a devoted marriage, a growing family, and the promise of a bright future. But Fritz's Uncle Karl lies in wait behind the scenes, hatching his newest plot. A shocking outcome of Vicky's Royal duties will bring fresh doubts to Fritz's heart, and his fatherhood.

As personal tragedy strikes and shakes them to their core, Fritz is forced to lead the largest battle history has ever seen. One which could change the face of Europe forever.

Vicky's best friend struggles to shield her daughters from the sinister force that seeks to control them. The youngest shares her grandfather's uncanny ability to know the truth behind others' motives. But can she see the truth in him? In such a dangerous world, what heroic role will this small child play?

Can they escape the danger and betrayal that lurks in every corner as they travel to the icy expanse of Russia, the peaceful Mediterranean shores, and the vast Eastern deserts?

Will Vicky and Fritz's love and marriage survive a mysterious illness, or will Uncle Karl's conspiracies tear them apart for good?

Fans of Clare McHugh's A Most English Princess, Mary Hart Perry's The Shadow Princess, and Daisy Goodwin's Victoria will be swept away by this gripping tale of love, war, and intrigue. With rich historical detail and deeply human struggles, Under the Sword, the third installment of The Rival Courts saga, brings to life the triumphs and tragedies in a fight against a nefarious trade which flourished in the shadows of the Royal court. A must-read for lovers of Victorian-era royal fiction.

 

Buy Link:

 Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/mqLqv6

 

Luv Lubker began life in the Animal World, researching creatures great and small since before she can remember, and earning her degree in chicken psychology by age twelve. Not long after, she immigrated to the Victorian era, where she has lived half her life in close company with the Brontë sisters and made friends with Queen Victoria’s extended family, whom she now knows quite as well as her own kin.

 

Born in a cattle trough in the Appalachian Mountains, Luv currently resides in Texas’ Great Plains when visiting the modern world. When she isn’t writing or reading, she delights in preparing and savoring gourmet raw food with her family and exploring nature on long bike rides. Her special abilities include researching in seven languages and riding a unicycle since age seven.

 

Luv’s research delves into the unwritten stories that history left behind. Through unpublished letters, altered manuscripts, and deeply buried secrets, she reveals emotional truths concealed beneath the era’s refined exterior. Her novels give voice to the silenced, reveal what Victorians were taught to suppress and what their biographers chose to omit, tracing invisible scars that shaped lives, choices, and history itself.

 Author Links:

 Website: https://TheRivalCourts.com

Twitter / X: https://x.com/LubkerLuv

Facebook Series Page: https://facebook.com/TheRivalCourts  

Facebook: https://facebook.com/Luvy.Lubker

Instagram: https://instagram.com/luvlubker

Threads: https://threads.net/@LuvLubker

Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/luvlubker/

Amazon Author Page: https://amazon.com/stores/Luv-Lubker/author/B0C5TRY327

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/21511046.Luv_Lubker

 

Book Spotlight and Excerpt: Under A Cloud by Luv Lubker

 

Vicky's father, Albert, the Prince Consort, has just died, leaving her and her family under a heavy cloud of grief, without their dearest friend and advisor, at a most critical time: The political horizon grows dark with storm clouds at the entry of Bismarck to Germany's political stage in 1862.

Will Fritz's courage stand the test as he confronts the spider in its web? Is Prussia really fighting for the rights of the Schleswig people, or is so much blood being shed for the sake of Prussia's aggrandizement?

Join Vicky and Fritz on their journeys under the blue cloudless skies of the Mediterranean to the peaceful heather-clad hills of the Highlands of Scotland; to the burning heat of the North African desert to the raging blizzards of a winter war in Denmark.

When Vicky's closest friend disappears, will she be able to keep the secret? Will old enemies prove to be friends, and old friends prove to be enemies?

 Buy Links:

 Universal Buy Link: https://books2read.com/u/mB1L5N

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 Excerpt

Bang! Fritz broke the surface of the water, looking about, startled. He had gone out for a swim daily since their arrival at Putbus. He had been under water, when he was sure he had heard the firing of a gun.

There it was again. Bang! Bang! He scrambled ashore, water streaming over his face as he ran his hand over his hair, and hurried up the beach towards the castle, forgetting his state of undress. He must know what this was about. He crouched down, stepping carefully through the underbrush, not wishing to be seen.

Bang! “Yes! I hit the top one!” he heard Vicky cry. “Can you?” He paused, watching the scene. Vicky had said she would teach Princess Putbus to shoot. He had forgotten about it. Bang! Bang! He watched, feeling a burst of pride as Vicky hit nearly impossible targets.

He was about to call out to her, when he became suddenly very aware of the twigs and brambles scratching at his legs and his bare chest as he crouched in the undergrowth. Water pooled at his feet, dripping heavily from his Schwimmhosen.

“Vicky?” he called softly. She looked around, obviously puzzled where his voice came from. “Vicky!” he called a little louder. She turned in the direction of the path to the beach, obviously expecting his voice to be coming from that direction. “Over here,” he called again.

“Fritz?” she called, hurrying towards him.

“Vicky, tell Princess Putbus not to come,” he said. Vicky paused, returning to her friend who was just starting towards them. She whispered something in her ear, and the Princess returned to the castle.

“Fritz, where are you?” Vicky cried, running back towards the thicket.

“Here.” He waved his arm, making the bush he knelt behind wave about. “I heard your shooting, and had forgotten what you said you would be doing, and wondered what was going on. And – ach! I think I need help getting up. These are digging into my legs. You have a sword with you, too, I see. Will you lend it to me?”

The sword hilt protruded through the bush, and he took it carefully, quickly cutting away some of the sharp branches. He rose, stepping out from behind the bush, but not fully. “I must go back to the beach.”

Vicky doubled over with laughter. “Fritz, it is not like you to forget your clothes,” she giggled.

Luv Lubker

Luv Lubker has lived in the Victorian era half her life, making friends with the Brontë sisters and the extended family of Queen Victoria. Now she knows them quite as well as her own family.

Born in a cattle trough in the Appalachian mountains, Luv lives in Texas – when she comes to the modern world.

When she isn't living in the Victorian era, she enjoys being with her family; making and eating delicious raw food, riding her bike (which she only learned to ride at 25, though she has ridden a unicycle since she was 7), and watching animals – the passion of her childhood.

 

Luv Lubker

 

Author Links:

 Website: https://www.therivalcourts.com

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/LubkerLuv

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheRivalCourts/

and https://www.facebook.com/luvy.lubker/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/luv-lubker-1916b81b0

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/llubker/

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/luvlubker/

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Luv-Lubker/author/B0C5TRY327

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/21511046.Luv_Lubker

Book Spotlight: ‘A Ha’penny Will Do’ by Alison Huntingford

 

‘A Ha’penny Will Do’

Alison Huntingford

 

Love, dreams and destitution

Three members of one family are linked by their struggle to survive poverty and war at the turn of the century. 

Kate, a homesick, lonely Irish immigrant, dreams of being a writer.  After difficult times in Liverpool she comes to London looking for a better life.  Hoping to escape from a life of domestic service into marriage and motherhood, she meets charming rogue William Duffield.  Despite her worries about his uncertain temperament, she becomes involved with him. Will it be an escape or a prison?

Fred is a restless elder son, devoted to his mother yet locked in a tempestuous relationship with his father.  War intervenes and he secretly signs up to serve abroad.  Is his bad reputation deserved?  What will become of him?

Joe, too young to sign up for WWI, is left to endure the hardships of war on the home front and deal with his own guilt at not being able to serve.  He starts an innocent friendship with his sister-in-law which sustains him through hard times.  Will he survive the bombs, the riots, the rationing and find true love in the end?

 These are their intertwined and interlocking stories recreated through the medium of diaries, letters and personal recollections, based on the author’s family history covering the period of 1879 – 1920. The truth is never plain and rarely simple.

This novel is a fresh and compelling look at life for the working-class poor in England at the end of the Victorian era.  Covering issues such as the struggle for home rule in Ireland, the hardships of domestic service, marital strife, the suffragettes and the horrors of World War 1 on the home front and abroad, this is a realistic and gripping tale which keeps the reader involved in their human plight all the way.

 BUY LINKS

Amazon UK   Amazon US   Barnes and Noble   Waterstones   Austin MacAuley Book Publisher

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Achievements:

Nominated for the Walter Scott prize for Historical Fiction  2019

Took part in ‘A Miscellany of Authors’ at Blandford Forum Literary Festival  2019

Western Morning News describes ‘The Glass Bulldog’ as ‘a gripping tale of dark pasts and second chances’   2019

5 star reviews for ‘The Glass Bulldog’ on Amazon, Goodreads and Facebook

Radio Interviews with Chat & Spin, BBC Radio Devon and The Voice FM (N.Devon)

Published a short novella ‘Someone Else’ available on Amazon  2020

Founded the South Hams Authors Network first meeting Sept 2021

Second full-length novel ‘A Ha’penny Will Do’ published January 2022

Author Takeover Day on the Historical Fiction Club Facebook Group Feb 2022

Book Launch and signing, Ivybridge Bookshop, February 2022

Readings at Ivybridge, Kingsbridge and Totnes libraries 2022

5 star reviews for ‘A Ha’penny Will Do’ on Amazon, Goodreads and Facebook

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Alison Huntingford

Contact details

Website   Facebook   Email   Twitter   Instagram

Spotlight on Mal Foster, author of Jude & Bliss

 

In the Victorian era, for many young women, going into domestic service was a significant source of employment where they found suitable work but with extended hours for a reasonable salary, receiving free accommodation as well as enjoying the perks and prestige of working for the aristocracy or other members of the upper or middle-classes.

As a matter of course, employers had a moral obligation, but one without a legal requirement to ensure their servants were kept clean, healthy, and well-nourished. However, for one poor girl, that, unfortunately, was not the case.

In 1896, Jude Rogers, a wide-eyed but vulnerable sixteen-year-old from Woking, Surrey, secures a position as a domestic servant at a large terraced house in Half Moon Street, near London's Piccadilly. Following a brief settling-in period, she quickly realises everything is not quite as it seems.

As time moves ruthlessly forward, what happens next is almost beyond comprehension. Jude finds herself in the most impossible of situations and finally succumbs to the pure evil dealt out by her employer.

This story is NOT for the faint-hearted!

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Mal Foster

Fun Facts

I used to belong to an amateur musical society in Camberley, Surrey, called CAMUS. In 1983 I was invited to play the part of Lt Joseph Cable in their stage version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s ‘South Pacific’, singing solo for the first time ever. ‘South Pacific’ was one of my late mother’s favourite films, so I gave her two tickets for the show, but didn’t tell her I was appearing. The look on her face when she saw me walk on stage was something else, and to this day, I still don’t know whether it was one of shock, horror, of just plain pride in her son who had obviously duped her.

Gozo, Malta, I regard as my second home. My third novel, ‘An Invisible Nemesis, published in 2019, is predominately set on the islands. I made my first visit to Malta alone in October 1988. The second day I was there, I was walking down a street in the capital, Valletta when I heard a voice, I recognised behind me. It was Mr Wilkinson (or Rodney), a teacher I hadn’t seen since leaving school some fifteen years previously. He somehow recognised and remembered me and with his wife, we spent the rest of the week sharing stories, ‘what might have beens’ and drinks together. He said, “one day I might make it as a writer!”

In 1984 I joined the railways fulfilling a series of roles before taking early retirement in 2014 after 30 years. In November 1998, as a station manager, I was on Royal Train duties. It was my task to escort HRH Prince Charles on to the train at Hampton Court railway station. It had passed midnight and a little worse for wear, he had been celebrating his fiftieth birthday at Hampton Court Palace. The train had been prepared for a trip to Sheffield where the prince had an engagement the following day. The media were at the station in numbers, expecting the prince to be with Camilla, it was just after he had started seeing her in the aftermath of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, just over a year before. Camilla wasn’t there, and the only thing the press photographers got, was an image of HRH Prince Charles and me walking along the station platform. It was quite amusing seeing myself labelled as his Royal Equerry in some of the national newspapers a couple of days later. 

It’s no secret that I had left school at just fifteen-years-old before taking any formal qualifications. My ambition was always to be a journalist but without the necessary qualifications that was never to be. Well, not until I had reached my late fifties anyway. In 2015 I was attending a local football match near where I live when I struck up a conversation with the new editor of the Woking News & Mail. She had seen some of my work on the local community website and was impressed with my style of writing. Within a week I joined the paper on a freelance basis. So, never, say never! 

I have a bit of a reputation for going to the pub. I’ve also been married three times, and by pure coincidence, I met all three of the ex-wives in pubs. (Two of them were barmaids). Towards the end of each marriage, all of them said, ‘Mal, you can never stay out of the pub.’ One good thing to come out of the recent Covid-19 restrictions is that I’ve been able to prove all of them wrong! 

 Buy Links

Amazon UK • Amazon US • Book Depository

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About the Author

Mal Foster

Mal Foster was born in 1956 in Farnham, Surrey, and grew up in nearby Camberley. He was educated at secondary modern level but left school at just fifteen years old to help support his single mother and younger brother. It was around this time that he began writing, and indeed, his first poems were published soon after. 

In 2007 his most widely read poem The Wedding was published in the Australian Secondary Schools anthology Poetry Unlocked' a book that formed part of its English Literature exam curriculum. The irony of its inclusion has always amused Mal considering he left school before gaining any formal qualifications himself.  

A former local journalist, his first novel The Asylum Soul, a historical tale of incarceration was published in 2015. A second book, Fly Back and Purify, a paranormal drama appeared in 2017. Described as an explosive conspiracy thriller, An Invisible Nemesis was published at the beginning of May 2019.

In November 2020, his fourth novel, Jude & Bliss, was published and marked a return to historical fiction for Mal. "This book is close to my heart, it's the one, I think, which will define the course of my future writing," he told one observer.  

Connect with Mal

 Website • Twitter • Instagram • Facebook

Early edition of Magna Carta discovered in Victorian scrapbook

A close-up view of one of four remaining copies of the original Magna Carta, a document written in 1215, is seen at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston June 30, 2014. (REUTERS/Gretchen Ertl)

An early edition of one of the world’s most famous documents, the Magna Carta, was unearthed in a pretty unexpected place – a scrapbook. Mark Bateson, a Kent, U.K.-based archivist, was tasked with looking for a charter from the town of Sandwich when he stumbled upon the rare find. He came across Sandwich’s Charter of the Forest in a Victorian-era scrapbook in the Kent County Council archives that just happened to also contain an edition of the groundbreaking document that dates back to 1300, the BBC reports.

This edition could be worth up to $15 million and is a very significant find, according to experts.

 

The find comes months before the 800^th anniversary of the sealing of the document that established the principles of the rule of law. The first copy of the Magna Carta was drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury on June 15, 1215. It was written to establish peace between King John of England and a group of rebel barons. Among the sanctions established by the law the Magna Carta ensured protections of church rights and limited feudal payments to the king.
The document found in Sandwich is not pristine – it was ripped and about a third of it was missing. Despite this, it is a rare and valuable find. The only other copy that dates back to 1300 is owned by Oriel College at Oxford University.
According the BBC, there are 24 known editions of the Magna Carta in existence
Fox News